1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to transceiver devices. More particularly, this invention relates to serializer/deserializer (SERDES) components of a transceiver device, and the phase-locking of a transmit clock signal phase with a receive clock signal phase.
2. Related Art
A serializer/deserializer (SERDES) device converts received high-speed serial data into low-speed parallel data at a receiver. The parallel data may then be processed and then passed to a transmitter. At the transmitter, the low-speed parallel data is converted back into high-speed serial data for transmission out of the SERDES device.
A SERDES device is used to control external devices, or used as a repeater, allowing data from one external device, such as a disk drive, to be transferred to another external device. For example, the external devices may be disk drives that include identical data, providing a back-up mechanism in the event that one disk drive fails. As another example, the external devices may be individual disk drives that, as a group, form one or more databases.
A SERDES device may include a plurality of SERDES cores. Each SERDES core may include one or more receiver/transmitter pairs. Multiple SERDES cores may be daisy-chained together such that data received by one core may be transmitted by another core.
Communication between a receiver and a transmitter of a SERDES device involves high-speed clocks. A typical mode of operation in a SERDES device is a repeat mode in which the transmit data frequency needs to track the receiver data frequency in order to preserve data integrity. This operation must be performed at the receiver without having to retime the recovered clock to the local clock.
For high-speed communication, one typically needs to have very well-matched clocks, especially if transferring data between SERDES cores on different substrates (e.g., chips) or boards. For example, if transferring data from a receiver on one SERDES core to a transmitter on another SERDES core, the clocks between the receiver and the transmitter should be matched in order to sample the data at the right time. If the clocks are not matched, the frequency difference between the two clocks will drift over time, resulting in what appears to be an extra pulse or a missing pulse. This frequency drift will eventually cause a loss of data integrity.
One solution is to use a common clock at the receiver and the transmitter. However, on today's large and complicated systems, it is not practical to run high-frequency lines between every receiver and transmitter. Furthermore, although electronic components are very small, there is a relatively large distance between them. It may not be feasible to maintain a common clock over such a distance. For similar reasons, it may not be feasible to maintain direct clock-matching over such a distance.
SERDES devices that work at much slower speeds and do not link many devices together may not have a frequency drift issue. For example, SERDES devices that work at about 2.5 Gigahertz may not have a frequency drift issue. However, more modem SERDES devices work at 4 Gigahertz or more.
In a transceiver, there is typically a digital portion and an analog portion. When synchronizing a transmitter clock to a receiver clock, and jumping from one frequency to another frequency, instability of the system and loss of data integrity may occur on the analog side. Furthermore, if the frequency change is too large, the new clock pulse width may be larger than the minimum clock pulse width required on the digital side. It is important to prevent large frequency changes such as that just described in order to preserve data integrity and prevent system errors.
What is needed is a high-speed SERDES transceiver device in which a transmitter clock signal is synchronized with a receiver clock signal without the frequency drift problems described above. Furthermore, what is needed is the capability to synchronize a transmitter clock signal with a receiver clock signal of a receiving component that is part of a different SERDES core, a different substrate, or even a different board, without the frequency drift problems such as those described above.
What is also needed is a mechanism to prevent transmitter clock frequency changes that are so large as to violate a minimum pulse width required by a receiver.